Under Paris (2024)

Score: 1.5 / 5

I'm all for a bonkers premise to spin a well-worn wheel in a new direction, especially just for fun. But the oddly popular (on social media, anyway) Under Paris, a recent Netflix-exclusive French feature, stems from a concept that is neither particularly original nor taken to particularly interesting conclusions. Worse, its story quickly evolves from what should have been a suitable plot to increasingly wacky nonsense with bizarre ideas and an obnoxious push for sequels. Basically, in what seemed to be Jaws or Piranha in the Seine, we're hoodwinked into something more like The Meg or Sharknado. Which might be your batshit B-movie taste, but not mine.

An effective opening scene takes place in a floating garbage patch in the open Pacific (which is evidently a real, and real tragic, phenomenon), when Sofia (I didn't know and didn't end up caring about the actors here, sorry) is researching a mako shark named Lilith. What an original name for a monstrous female. Her husband is killed while attempting to take a blood sample. The film jumps three years into the future, as Sofia is working in Paris, and suddenly it becomes clear that there is a shark in the Seine, the iconic river snaking through the city center. Not just any shark, though: Lilith, of course. Logic aside, this revelation sets Sofia up to overcome her trauma and redeem her score against the beast.

The Seine is hosting the swimming portion of an upcoming triathlon (again, it feels very much like the summer camp of the original Piranha or the spring break party of its remake, to say nothing of Independence Day in Jaws). Sofia and her team know that danger is in the water, but they're having trouble bringing enough proof to the authorities; the mayor, meanwhile, utterly refuses to cancel or postpone the event, or even to establish reasonable safety measures. An interminably long setup finally reaches its payoff when, as the triathlon commences, competitors start -- bloop -- disappearing under the murky, roiling water. This climax might make the film worth watching for you, depending on your taste for the subgenre of killer shark horror; it almost did for me. It's a wonderfully tense exercise in insane spectacle that offers images fans will want to lock in their memories.

For a movie that looks pretty expensive otherwise, too many shots of Lilith herself look unfortunately cheap, and by the time the climax ends, I found myself wanting more. And then the film decides to give us more. Far too much more. Because -- SPOILER ALERT -- the "heroes" discover that Lilith has been breeding asexually while adapting to freshwater and is actively filling the river with her brood. Mixing the end of Piranha 3D with something Roland Emmerich might have dreamed up, it all teeters into one of the most disappointing denouements and threats of sequels I've seen in years.

Had this film followed through on its most basic premise, it could have been really cool and indeed offered insight into other follow-ups. Consider aquatic predators in other watery cities, like Venice or Singapore, and how fun that could be. There's some real interest and inspiration in the triathlon scene, and I'd have loved something more like Jaws meeting United 93 or Stronger, a tense realistic horror/thriller about trauma and average nobodies stepping up to save people in need. More practical effects, less CGI hooey with weapons and computers and gimmicks about a score to settle from the opposite side of the world. More messaging about environmentalism and pollution and skewed politics that value money and image over human lives. Instead, we got something more like The Meg in action and bunk sci-fi, both of which I'll gladly and permanently cross off my list when Shark Week comes 'round each year.